Month: June 2007

There are some businesses investors consider, as a rule, profitless. Airlines, passenger trains, and, at least recently, newspapers all seem to be ‘profitless pariahs.’ The airline industry, since deregulation in the late 70s, has had a hard time regularly pleasing investors. Considering it is cheaper now, in real dollars, to fly from New York to Greece than it was in 1965, it is no wonder the profits have sometimes been elusive.

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Oracle Corporation (ORCL) stated on Tuesday, in a public announcement, fourth-quarter profits rose 23% from a year ago. The large software producer attributed the gains to increased sales of new software contracts and from increased market share.

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As you may have heard, Apple (AAPL) is planning to launch its iPhone this week. The competition in the phone market is brutal and many have speculated how Apple can compete in such a crowded marketplace. Interestingly, there aren’t an excessive number of phones in the high-end market where Apple finds itself.

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The Senate passed legislation yesterday requiring the production of ethanol used in auto fuel to increase to billion gallons a year by 2022. The final production level would increase the level of ethanol production seven times the current level. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, in a widely covered press conference, proclaimed, “This bill starts America on a path toward reducing our reliance on oil.”

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Best Buy (BBY) Chief Financial Officer Darren Jackson publicly speculated yesterday about how the company allocates capital. The discussion has increasing relevance in light of this week’s announcement of Home Depot (HD) share-repurchase program.

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Wal-Mart (WMT) plans to enter the consumer-banking world with around 1,000 Wal-Mart MoneyCenters in stores across the US by the end of 2008. The chain will also sell prepaid Visa debit cards. This will provide lower-income shoppers, who may not have access to conventional banking, a way to participate in cashless transactions.

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A number of our potential trades from last month ended up returning solid potential profits for the month of June. Today in the PowerOptions weblog, we will take a retrospective look at these companies and look for nice trading options in the coming months.

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Burger King (BKC) went public in May 2006 and has seen a doubling of its stock price since August of 2006. If you were paying attention to our blog in 2006, you might recall the article “Burger King (BKC) – Whopper Covered Calls”. The stock has gained over 50% since we wrote the article.

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The Federal Trade Commission is investigating a total of three online-advertising potential mergers. The three antitrust reviews involve merger deals Microsoft, Yahoo and Google are proposing with three web-advertising firms.

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Today on the PowerOptions blog, we’re going to take a quick look at the stocks Mad Money’s Jim Cramer finds most appealing. Then, we will cover how the average investor, using tools available from PowerOptions, can find the most lucrative and attractive options trade on these stocks. (Note: Jim Cramer does not endorse any of the option strategies based on his stock selections illustrated in this article or on blog.poweropt.com)